the growth drum, then that's the key value you should prioritize with your community. That's the objective that you should be measuring and reporting on first.

We're also seeing the rise of community entrepreneurship, where the community is the product.

profession. I realized I was largely on my own. Slowly, I started meeting other people who, like me, were building real communities for businesses. I ended up starting a blog and job board called TheCommunityManager.com

There are two things that every community program should focus on: How it creates value, belonging, and emotional safety for members How it creates value and measurable results for the business

Members will have a history of experiences together and the belief that there will be more experiences together in the future.

companies whose core offering is a community, or is inherently social. Engagement: Customer experience, retention, and loyalty. The goal is to increase customer retention, average contract value, and customer satisfaction by giving customers a sense of belonging and organizing engaging and valuable community experiences. Success: Customer success

Community level Grow active membership in our online community spaces. Grow attendance and engagement at CMX Connect events. Grow active subscribers to the CMX Weekly newsletter. Increase the activation rate of new members joining the community.

Integration and Fulfillment of Needs This essentially means that by joining a community, members get what they hoped to get by joining.

I like to use the community life cycle. The concept of a community life cycle was first developed by Alicia Iriberri and Gondy Leroy in their research on online communities.